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Gungir's Ghost
Recap for 7/19/2017 This took place during the fall of 1240. So Gungir is back! Wait I went too fast let me slow down a bit. The forests that had been burned last year were surprisingly growing back at a quicker rate than anyone had expected. As a result the trade and taxes started to slow down once again. The forests would cut off the lesser roads to the smaller villages in southern Italy. As a result Naples and it's vassals' taxes were slow coming so Naples has been having a hard time paying off it's merchants, so trade was slowing down. Luckly the towns that Count Simeon controls were not feeling the down turn on trade nearly as much as some of the other towns. This was because Punta Rossa and Faro have excellent harbors so ships are able to easily dock and offload cargo. Also the road from Faro to Terricina has been covered with the fast growing forests, but someone with good bureacratic sense (Leticia and Mungo) has seen to it that that road has been well maintained so supplies have been able to come and go without too much hardship. That being said, it came to Mungo's attention that the fishing trade in Punta Rossa has slowed down to a crawl in the past few weeks and he sent Halfden, Nicholas, and Orlanduccus to find out why. The group went down to the docks and found Eldred fishing off the docks. When they asked him why the fishing had slowed down. He told them that the fishermen were afraid to go out to sea because a number of the fishermen had gone out fishing and never returned. The group went to the local fishermen's tavern "The Fish Guts" to speak with the remaining fishermen and get to the bottom of this. They found Carlo, one of the fishermen, sitting at the bar glumly drinking. When they asked him what was going on he said that over the course of the past few weeks fishermen had gone out to fish but hadn't returned. He said "it not uncommon for one or two fishermen to go missing, a bad boat or an unexpected storm, but six people go missing in the span of a few weeks, it's too dangerous to go fishing." He spoke of how yesterday when he went fishing he took Lucas, the youngest and least experienced fisherman. They went out to the usual fishing spot and began casting their nets. When suddenly, Lucas just stood up and dove headfirst into the water and didn't come back up. It didn't make any sense to Carlo, because he didn't think Lucas had ever swam before and couldn't understand why he would do that. The group convinced Carlo to take them out to that fishing spot to see if they could figure out what was going on. When they got out to the spot they cast out the nets and pulled in a lot of fish. So much fish that they had to go back to the dock and offload the fish. They then went out again to a different spot and cast their nets. This time they didn't catch too many fish, but they did catch a strange piece of wood. It was a shaft of wood about a foot and a half long, waterlogged, and about an inch thick. one end was a rounded off and the other end was broken off. It was covered with carvings of fish, sea sepents and the head of a wolf. Orrlanduccus suddenly remebered that this piece of wood was the shaft of Gungir's ax Grizelda. It was starting to get dark so they headed back to the docks. When they got back to the docks they saw that the fishwives (the women who would gut, clean, and salt barrel the fish) were clumped together and crying. When the group asked what was happening they said that Lucas' family was dead. The group went to Lucas' hut and when they went inside they saw the room was in shambles, the furniture was broken and Lucas' wife was found dead on their bed. It looked like she had been chopped up with an ax. When they moved her body, they found Lucas' infant child had been smothered underneath the wife. When the group asked around the neighbors said that they had heard arguing a few nights ago, but Lucas and his wife had had arguements in the past about how Lucas hated being a fisherman and was going to make a name for himself in Naples, so they didn't think anything of it. The group was afraid that the ghost of Gungir was loose and killing the fishermen, so they convinced Carlo to come back with them and spend the night at the Covenant barracks. When they got to the barracks the other Grogs wanted to know why a fisheman was sleeping with them. The group told them about the ghost of Gungir and it killing all the fishermen. When they talked about it killing Lucas' wife and child, Lippo said that he had seen Lucas leaving Punta Rossa from the south gate earlier this morning. The group immediately got on horses and headed out to find Lucas believing him to be possesed by the ghost of Gungir and heading to Naples. They stopped at Terracina to see if Lucas had stopped there, but the guards at the gate said a lot of people come and go through Terracina so the group informed the guards to be on the lookout for Lucas and they continued towards Naples. When they got to Naples's North Gate they asked the Gate guards if they had seen a man fitting Lucas' description. Because of the problems with Belgen, everyone who enters Naples has to state their name, where they are from, and what they are doing in Naples. This information is then put down in writting. The clerk at the gate checked his records, but no one fitting Lucas' description had passed through that gate. The group asked the clerk to inform the other gates to be on the lookout for Lucas and the clerk told them they would need to speak with the local magistrate. The group went to the local magistrate and told him the news. The magistrate wrote out the description and sent it to the other gates to be on lookout. the group asked if maybe Lucas could have slipped in by bribing the guards. The Magistrate told them that wouldn't happen. The last guard who took a bribe and was found out, was publicly executed along with the other guards at that gate for not reporting the bribe in the first place. The group then went to an inn to rest from their journey and wait to see if the gate guards would catch Lucas. Before they were able to rest though, all the bells in town began ringing and the guards started rushing towards the south gate. The group went to the south gate to see what was happening. They convinced the guards to let them up onto the parapet to let them see what was happening. They saw that a group of 10 satyrs and 10 centaurs were standing just inside the tree line at the south gate. A satyr dressed in finer clothes stepped forward ( although he was still out of bow shot) and pulled out a piece of parchment and in a loud ringing voice that could be heard on the wall told the city of Naples that they were derelict in paying their taxes to Queen Belgen and that this was their final warning to pay their taxes or Belgen's forces would return and punish Naples. A lone crossbowman on the wall fired a shot at the finely dressed satyr. The arrow went through the parchment and landed in between the satyr's legs. The commander on the wall struck the crossbowman for firing without his orders. He then turned to his second-in-command and whispered "make sure that bowman is given an extra tot of grog this evening. That was a damn good shot." Meanwhile the finely dressed satyr was enraged and began screaming in a unnerving voice that was half human and half goat bleating. The other satyrs took up the scream and the centaurs began beating the butts of their lances against the ground. The trees around Belgen's forces pulled themselves out of the ground and began moving towards the city wall. The people on the wall waited until the trees got close to the wall and began pouring oil onto the trees and setting the oil on fire. They then used billhooks and pikes to push the burning trees off the wall. By this time the town milita had made it to the battle by leaving through the east and west gates and moving towards the south gate. The milita formed ranks and started steadly moving towards the satyrs. Then a blond haired man broke ranks from the milita and swinging an ax rushed the satyrs. The miltia and the satyrs met and started killing each other. The centaurs tried to flank the milita and hit them from behind, but the archers on the wall kept firing arrows at them and they couldn't form a full charge against the milita. Soon Belgen's forces realized they couldn't take the milita and retreated into the forest. As they were retreating the finely dressed satyr's voice rang out over the battlefield "Tratiors! Traitors! Swear your allegance to Belgen, pay your taxes and overthrow the Usurper. All those who follow this Usurper will feel Belgen's wrath!" After the battle had ended the group went out on to the battlefield to see if they could find the blonde ax weilding man (they believed it was Lucas) They found him with a broken leg and frothing at the mouth, while dragging himself towards injuried satyrs and hacking them to pieces. Nicholas tried to kick him in the head to knock him unconcious, but he rolled a 22 and killed Lucas instead. They dragged him back into Naples and saw that the ax he was holding was Grizelda. The only differences was that the blond hair on the ax head was gone and the broken shaft had been smoothed on the jagged end and covered in hide wrappings. Lucas had Grizelda in a death grip and the group had to break his fingers to get it out of his hand. As they were doing this Nicholas touched the ax head and heard a whispering voice in his head say "Find me a warrior worthy to carry me." The group put Grizelda in a large heavy sack and took it back to Punta Rossa. They informed Mugo of everything and the group (Orrlanduccus, Nicholas, Halfden, and Mungo decided that they wouldn't tell the wizards about Grizelda, but they were going to hold a tourney to find a warrior worthy for the ax. Mungo did however, decide to tell the Wizards about what had happened in Naples in regards to what Belgen's forces had done. So we can have a wizard's meeting the next time we meet to discuss if we are going to do anything about all this.